Cyberspace Deductions
by Idrelle Miocovani
Summary: Sherlock attempts to deduce the identity of a mystery woman with whom he has been in contact at an Internet chat room.


**A/N: **Written for a quote roulette challenge. The quote I received and had to work with got written into the scene itself, so I won't write it out here.

This little scene has a backstory to it. Basically, if we ever find out how John and Sherlock got out of the mess at the end of The Great Game, this might be how Sherlock may come to interact with a certain female character we know. Possibilities and speculation only; this will probably end up being completely AU by the time 2011 rolls around.

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**Cyberspace Deductions**

"I have a suspicion about you," her message said. The font she had chosen was pretty – something custom-made, elegantly slanted, like old-fashioned handwriting with a foundtain pen, yet completely legible onscreen. She had changed the colour to red to make it stand out. What the purpose of the colour red was, he had yet to decide, but he had an inkling that it would come to him eventually.

Maybe it had to do with personality. She was fiery. Feisty. That was obvious enough.

"Oh?" he asked. He sent the message right away and leaned back in his chair to wit. He wasn't inclined to tell her, but he considered suspicions to be the best way to start – there was so much you can learn from a person simply by confirming your suspected facts and observing their reactions.

The computer beeped. She had sent her message.

"Yes," she wrote. "It's an amusing one. Would you care to hear… or, actually, read?"

He raised an eyebrow, thinking how interesting this conversation would be in person. "I would. What do you suspect about me?"

She wasted no time in getting back to him.

"You've always been like this, haven't you?" she wrote in her bright red font. "This insane enjoyment, the kick you get out of solving a mystery. The more complicated, the better. The world's too slow for you, Sherlock; it's the only way it can keep up with you."

He stared at his computer screen, his hands resting on the keyboard, waiting. Very interesting, this girl, this _woman._ That was the problem with the Internet – he didn't know who she was, but she knew him.

That wouldn't stay true for very long; he already had his suspicions about her.

His hands sailed over the keys as he typed the next message.

"You've been listening. You've been watching, haven't you?"

"Just trying to be observant," she wrote back. She added a smiley – she was being whimsical. "Don't you like observant people?"

"Sure," he typed. "The unobservant kinds are dullards who annoy me."

"And as always, you do your best to insult everyone. Have you always been like this?"

He frowned. "I suppose so." He paused. What was she trying to get at? "What led you on?"

Her next message reached him faster than he had expected. She was either an exceptionally fast reader and typist, or she had planned her conversation out in advance.

"That absolutely resolute shrug you give anyone who tells you to piss off," she wrote. "The average person's response to 'piss off' is to swear at you, or at least give you some kind of decent comeback. Not you. You shrug and ignore them. If anything, you're got steel skin. I don't think you'd be offended by anything, except the outstanding stupidity of the general population."

His bottom lip twitched. She had a sense of humour, this mystery girl. Despite not being able to actually hear her voice, he could picture it in his head and it was familiar. She had a very distinct voice. He was close to figuring out her identity. So very close.

He had to keep her interested.

Except all she seemed interested in was himself.

_Oh well,_ he thought and began to type.

"It's true," he wrote. "Most people do not understand how I work. They don't see the way I see, or hear what I hear. I tell them to look, but they can't. There is so much in this world that is visible in plain sight if you put your mind in the proper place; except most people do not. They're taken aback and telling me to piss off is a defence mechanism to soothe their shock."

He sent the message and waited as it hurtled through cyberspace to the mystery woman on the other end of the line.

Moments later, a new message popped up.

"Maybe they think your deductions are an invasion of privacy. Have you ever considered that?"

"I can't help it if a person's life story is written in their face."

"Then perhaps you should have the decency to keep quiet about it. Have you considered that?"

"Yes, I have. Many times; my flatmate tells me it constantly. But I have come to my own conclusion that I am not a decent person, and therefore the argument is obsolete."

The screen flashed. Two words had popped up: "Go on."

_Now I've got your attention,_ he thought, his fingers flickering over the keyboard as fast as they could.

"The fact of the matter is that I am used to it. I am used to being different. I am used to the weird looks that other people give me whenever I say something. It is exceptionally irritating that the world revolves at such as a slow pace, but perhaps it is better this way."

"Oh God," she typed, "imagine it! The world working at the same level as you. I'm not sure it could handle it."

"A slow world is a boring world."

"Yes."

"I have tried to explain that numerous times, yes. Ordinary life – the telly, the gossip, the normal things that normal people are intrigued by – they are far too simple."

"TV isn't supposed to be complicated," she wrote. "It's supposed to go over your head. Now theatre, on the other hand, that's for artists. It takes a greater mind to understand it, and maybe a greater one to appreciate it. Most TV shows – think of all those reality ones – are beyond stupid."

He eyed the screen. "True," he typed. "It drives me mad; it is far too easy to solve. Ordinary life is not a puzzle. Mysteries, on the other hand, are terribly fascinating. They're puzzles to be untangled. The more twisted, the better."

"I like the sound of that," she wrote. "It's got your distinct sense of humor in it.

"Humour?"

His eyes narrowed.

_I've almost got you now, American girl. _

"Yes. Humor, Sherlock. You can be quite funny when you want to."

"Humour has nothing to do with it," he typed. He paused and then added, "I've always been a detective; I can't even remember when I started. It would be utterly strange not to be one; it's all in the way I see the world."

"'_I was in the middle before I knew that I had begun,'"_ she wrote.

He leaned back in his chair and looked at the quote.

"Jane Austen, _Pride and Prejudice_," he wrote.

"I thought that might catch your interest," she told him.

_Now I've got you,_ he thought triumphantly.

"Interest caught," he typed.

"I know what you're thinking."

"Do you?"

"You're trying to find out who I am; you think the quote is a clue."

He smiled. "And by telling me that you have inadvertently given me a second, related clue."

"Maybe. But then you should judge whether I'm one step ahead or behind you."

He shook his head. "I don't need to judge; I already know."

"Do you?"

"I know from the way you write – it is identical to the way you speak."

He hit 'send'. The message disappeared. He waited.

He glanced at the clock; thirty seconds went by and there was no answer.

He smiled.

The computer beeped.

"Oh really?" her response said. She had dropped the red font now. "I could be disguising it."

"No," he typed, "you've said that only to try to throw me off your trail by forcing me to question your style of writing. That tells me that my first assumption is correct. As for my second assumption, I can tell from your typing that you are clearly someone who cares about the English language. Most people, educated or not, cannot be bothered to use proper spelling and grammar within Internet chatrooms. Even typos are frequent in the writing of those who do. Yet you have responded immediately to my messages quickly and precisely – and without error."

"You think I am an English teacher?"

"Hardly. For your cyberspace convenience, I'll say that I am laughing at that statement right now."

"Oh dear. LOL."

He shook his head, but he could not stop his smile any longer. He was closing in on her.

"And again," he typed back. "That is a sure sign that you are trying to throw me off your scent."

"How?"

"That was your first usage of Internet slang since we began this conversation."

"I see," her message said after several moments. "Do continue, I am very interested."

"Your word choice indicates that you are American," he typed. "During our previous discussion about the simplicity of television programmes, you used the abbreviation 'TV' and never once did 'telly' cross your fingers."

"'Telly' is such a ridiculous word."

"As ridiculous as you may find it, even _I_ use it."

"I'm sure there's some greater message about yourself right there," she wrote.

"Then there is the letter U," he continued, ignoring her statement.

"_The letter U?"_

"Yes," he wrote. "The poor U, always neglected by our _American_ cousins. You spelled 'humour' without it."

He waited. She didn't respond. Perhaps she was thinking things over; perhaps she had left. Yet she hadn't bothered to sign off, so most likely she was still there.

"Point taken," her message said when it finally came.

"There is one more thing," he wrote. "That quote you sent me… it is only part of a greater quote. The full text is '_I cannot fix on the hour, or the spot, or the look or the words, which laid the foundation. It is too long ago. I was in the middle before I knew that I had begun',_ spoken by Mr Darcy to Elizabeth Bennet when asked how he came to love her."

"Yes? And?"

"Either you were implying that the quote could be used to describe myself and my way of perceiving the world," he wrote, "or it was a clever indication of your true identity, especially when I have your words about theatre being superior to the telly to consider. I seem to recall a certain American Broadway singer with an excellent voice gracing the stage of the West End and making waves in a sea of critics in a revival of _First Impressions,_ a musical based on _Pride and Prejudice."_

"And your point is?"

"I saw that show. Several times."

"Did you now?"

"I was also involved in the scandal that took the actress playing Elizabeth Bennet off the stage."

"How wonderful. I would like to hear the story."

"I'm sure you're already familiar with it," he wrote. He paused, clicking his tongue. "I remember you very well, Miss Adler," he typed furiously. "You're the only woman who's beaten me, and it was only once. Don't think that you will ever have the opportunity to do so again."

The message flew away into cyberspace. He waited, fingers pressed together; he stared at the screen, bidding her answer to come back.

"You know what, Sherlock?" the message said when it finally came.

"What?" he wrote.

"I am only going to say this to you once," Irene Adler's final message said. "Piss off."

Sherlock snorted and snapped his laptop shut.

_fin_

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**Wow, Sherlock's hard to write! No wonder John's usually the narrator… **

**I hope you enjoyed and thanks for reading! **


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